Urban sprawl is a major challenge for European territories and in particular for Belgium. It is a process of massive urbanization in the peripheries of cities. Those spaces are qualified as periurban or ... [more ▼]

Urban sprawl is a major challenge for European territories and in particular for Belgium. It is a process of massive urbanization in the peripheries of cities. Those spaces are qualified as periurban or suburban. This urbanization has many consequences, among which are architectural and urban evolutions. We have defined periurban form as a state of development of peri-urban areas, formulated from their built components and their organization. In this frame, our main objective is to improve the knowledge of the periurban form. In other words, we aim to contribute to the emergence of a framework for thinking about the actuality and the future of periurban morphological characteristics. For us, it is an essential prerequisite to manage their architectural and urban character. To bring a contribution to this conceptual framework, we have structured our scientific approach upon three more specific objectives. Those objectives structure our thesis. The first objective is the assessment of knowledge and recognition of the specificities of peri-urban areas. The second chapter of this dissertation is a critical review of knowledge of peri-urban areas. The third chapter is a study of the language used in their description and their legal and operational management. The second objective of this thesis is to develop a tool to analyze morphological characteristics of periurban built fabrics. Chapter four of this dissertation focuses specifically on periurban forms and on their analysis. We built a method of observation and morphological analysis of periurban areas. We tested this method to analyze Liège periurban areas. We introduce its development and we comment its results. This method allowed us to construct an original typology of periurban built fabric and thus to propose a framework for characterizing the periurban form. The third objective concerns proposal of scenarios about potential futures of the periurban form. In the fifth chapter of this dissertation we used the results of our typological classification in order to propose prospective simulations of the evolution of periurban form. On basis of our former results, we built scenarios of potential urban development and we simulated the evolution of the periurban form to which they lead. [less ▲]

Through various morphological studies, this doctoral research has validated the hypothesis of a typology of constructions set for the description of the built-up component of the suburban landscape. This ... [more ▼]

Through various morphological studies, this doctoral research has validated the hypothesis of a typology of constructions set for the description of the built-up component of the suburban landscape. This article relates the development of this typology. [less ▲]

The Walloon territory is legally fragmented in specific functional areas. Each one of them has formal characteristics which can enter in visual conflict. On the basis of sites observations, we analyse ... [more ▼]

The Walloon territory is legally fragmented in specific functional areas. Each one of them has formal characteristics which can enter in visual conflict. On the basis of sites observations, we analyse landscape and urban qualities of limits between activities estates and cores of habitat. We also wonder what means to implement to improve their cohabitation. [less ▲]